Introducing the Arduino and Robotics from Development to Implementation eBook
Arduino boards are open-source electronics platforms outfitted with microcontrollers, flash memory, I/O (Input/Output) pins, various ports, and other connectors for programming and connecting to other devices. The first board, the Serial Arduino, was introduced in 2005 by an Italian startup of the same name and was designed as a low-cost platform to create devices that can interact with the environment using sensors and actuators. These little boards have come a long way and in this eBook, you can learn how to use them for the purpose of robotics and creating your own robot.
Here's a Preview of the eBook
Programming robots can be done using various apps, including the Arduino IDE (Integrated Development Environment), which is open-source and written in Java (C++). The IDE allows users to write code in a unique environment, with syntax highlighting and other features designed to make coding easier. The app includes a code editor with features such as text cutting and pasting, text searching and replacement, automatic indenting, and brace matching, and it also provides simple one-click mechanisms to compile and upload programs, known as “sketches,” to an Arduino board. It also provides a message area, a text console, a toolbar with buttons for standard functions, and operation menus. Users will often upload the sketches they created for specific project builds to sites that host open-source content, allowing others to download and apply them to their builds. This makes it easy for beginners to complete their projects and learn how to code within the IDE environment.
Another popular software platform for robotics projects is the Robotics Operating System (ROS), and although it may sound like a traditional operating system, it isn’t. Instead, the Robotics Operating System is an open-source framework with libraries and a set of tools that provide the functionality of an OS on a heterogeneous computer cluster. The platform provides services such as hardware abstraction, low-level device control, implementation of commonly-used functionality, message-passing between processes, and package management.ROS is based on a graph architecture where processing occurs in nodes that may receive, post, and multiplex sensor, control, state, planning, actuator, and other messages. In other words, it connects hardware with software to allow for an advanced programming environment for controlling low-level hardware. Users can even simulate their processes and visualize them in 3D to see how the robot will function. Although the Robotic Operating
The system seems too far advanced for some users, there are many tutorials and walkthroughs that make it easy to understand. This eBook is just a brief overview of the Arduino platform and how it can be applied to robotics projects – it only scratches the surface of what can be accomplished with a bit of hardware and imagination. The amount of information available could fill volumes, and that information will continue to grow as new development boards are introduced and as hardware continues to become more affordable. If you’ve ever wanted to try your hand at building robots, now is a great time to take that first step into a wonderful world using Arduino!
